Dept. of defense hotline number for fraud:800/424-9098
Dept. of defense hotline number for fraud:800/424-9098
Research and Development Support
NorthTide has a contract supporting The United States Army Aeromedical Research Laboratory (USAARL). NorthTide supports this contract with Aeromedical, Mechanical, Human Factor, and Biomedical engineers that perform medical research related to Aeromedical and ground ambulance evacuation and prevention of injury. The engineers develop and fabricate the test environment that will assess and evaluate the performance of medical systems and subsystems in the aeromedical evacuation environment, ensuring the safety of the aircraft, crew, and patients. NorthTide’s engineers are responsible with maintaining the capability of testing and evaluating, also with the efficiency of medical systems and subsystems in the U.S. military Aeromedical evacuation environment. The primary focus is on Airworthiness Certification and Evaluation (ACE). As such, the NorthTide staff members working with the ACE Branch contribute to the protection of the injured or ill Warfighter through the MEDEVAC system and subsystems.
Engineering, System Engineering and Process Engineering Support
NorthTide and our partners offer various Engineering support roles required for Seaport-e projects and programs. Our team’s staff is fully trained, highly qualified, seasoned, and experienced engineers and technicians with the knowledge, skillsets, abilities, and IT aptitude to support and enhance the Navy’s real-world mission. Our engineers are extremely adept at troubleshooting, analyzing, and implementing corrective/fix actions. They have proven to be important members for Government teams on numerous instances while providing direct, strategic, and tactical communications. NorthTide is currently providing engineering and installation support for the Headquarters U.S. Pacific Command (USPACOM) on their Information Technology Modernization and Support Program. Relevant roles we are currently fulfilling include: Network Engineers, System Administrators, and System Integrators. The objective of these engineers is to assess, design, validate, deploy, implementation and certification of standardized, robust, and low-maintenance application systems and network infrastructure supporting USPACOM network services. NorthTide’s engineers conform to the IT services best practices outlined in the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) and the DoD-ITIL.
Modeling, Simulation, Stimulation, and Analysis Support
NorthTide has past performance and strengths that focus around the testing of medical equipment using a specifically designed laboratory. Onsite NorthTide Engineers at USAARL formulate and carry out the rigorous testing of the medical equipment. This testing ensures the safe interaction among medical equipment, patients, aircrew, and aircraft. Engineers design set up and conducts testing of the products through vibration, altitude and extreme atmosphere situations. Vibration testing is done through specially designed vibration tables which yield data that is then compared with past testing results. In addition, Engineers determine the ability of the product to withstand extreme weather conditions by using the atmosphere chamber. Hot, cold, humidity, explosive atmosphere, rapid decompression, acceleration drop, salt fog, sand, dust and rain conditions are carried our within. Results of the testing are analyzed and documented in published reports.
System Design Documentation and Technical Data Support
NorthTide has a broad experience in creating, vetting, and maintaining document control of system design documentation for Federal Government customers. We recognize the importance of delivering system design documentation that is forward-looking that will allow for a more efficient system integration and deployment. The outputs of the system requirements/analysis concepts are turned into actual designs that are reviewed and honed into a System Design document. Our engineers will incorporate all relevant standards into a system design, while leveraging our knowledge of industry best practices to produce a ‘best-of-breed’ system solution. We will use surveillance tools, such as an RTM, to ensure all system allocated requirements are being met and that system performance will meet the Navy’s requirements. This effort will enable NorthTide to: compare and validate existing, updated, and new information; address inconsistencies; and collect necessary inputs to assist the Navy in developing Concept of Operations (CONOPS) documentation for integration of the new technology. It will consequently provide an accurate representation of the goals and objectives of the system as it relates to the overarching architecture, and enable us to produce a high-quality System Design that covers all pertinent system performances and Navy requirements.
Software Engineering, Development, Programming, and Network Support
NorthTide along with teaming partner Vistronix have extensive experience in researching, investigating, and developing emerging technologies for potential insertion into the fielding of new systems or existing architecture to enhance system efficiency, production, and usability. CMMI Maturity Level 3 process is at the core of Vistronix’s Agile-based System Development Life Cycle (SDLC). This framework is the foundation for Software Development Plans that we will develop for the Navy and as required at the Task Order level. It manages systems throughout their lifecycles, including key actions and artifacts. The SDLC can be tailored; it spans the entire system lifecycle and aligns with the IEEE/EIA Std. 12207 to address areas critical to success, including enterprise architecture, governance, organizational change management, release management, post-deployment maintenance and continuous process improvement. NorthTide and its teaming partner Vistronix will provide the Navy with our proven project management, reliable, repeatable, CMMI level 3 and ISO 9001: 2008-certified processes, seasoned project managers with decades of government software development experience, and innovative solutions to achieve the Navy’s goals and exceed expectations.
Configuration Management (CM) Support
NorthTide currently provides Configuration Management (CM) support to USPACOM on the IT Modernization and Support contract. In support of this contract, NorthTide is providing a CM Engineer who is responsible for providing Subject Matter Expertise (SME) and oversight on CM disciplines and processes in support of the HQ USPACOM missions and capabilities under the authority of the HQ USPACOM CIO. The CM Engineer performs CM using ITIL based Configuration and Change processes and a Configuration Management System (CMS). The CM Engineer develops and promotes plans, policies, processes, procedures and resources for the management and control of the commands CM processes. The CM Engineer records the receipt of new or revised configuration changes into the appropriate CMS library and archives records. The CM Engineer reviews CM data, develops and maintains CM numbering and naming scheme, identifies service assets and Configuration Items, and develops and maintains HQ USPACOM Service Catalog. The CM Engineer manages and leads the commands Configuration Control Board (CCB). The CM Engineer ensures configuration changes are recorded, assessed, authorized, prioritized, planned, tested, implemented, documented and reviewed in a standardized and controlled manner. The CM Engineer conducts coordination with external CM related agencies and activities to identify CM methodologies and approaches for use by HQ USPACOM. This includes coordination support for efforts by academia, corporations, vendors, and other Government agencies and organizations.
Quality Assurance (QA) Support
NorthTide and our partner’s Quality Assurance Support knowledge and expertise is clearly demonstrated in our successful past experiences in delivering quality solutions and systems to our customers. NorthTide is currently providing a Quality Assurance Analyst under the USAARL contract. NorthTide’s Quality Assurance Analyst has formulated and implemented quality assurance policies and procedures for the technical accreditation of the test laboratory. The Analyst performs regular quality system audits and surveillances of the ongoing project testing to ensure that design and development of the testing meet the necessary level of compliance instituted by military regulatory standards. NorthTide is also facilitating the development of ISO-17025 standard processes and procedures and future certification.
NorthTide’s teaming partner, Vistronix, has been instrumental in defining, creating, and implementing Quality Assurance (QA) teams to support software testing, and QA activities. Their QA team provides standardized testing services across many applications following Application Portfolio Management (APM) best practices, including lean and repeatable processes like centralized management, streamlined reporting, and cross-team collaboration. QA, a required component of software engineering, spans all phases defined in their SDLC. Vistronix’s QA team ensures that the SDLC framework is followed. They focus on early detection and correction of flawed processes and products, and realistic assessment of project risks and mitigation strategies. They will continue to manage QA functions by implementing and improving processes that support the SDLC for preexisting and new application investments in current environments, and cloud and mobile environments.
NorthTide’s QA Team testing services include: integration, installation/deployment, functional, usability/Section 508 compliance, compatibility, defect, regression, and load/performance testing. For each project, QA relies on deliverables defined in the SDLC — such as the Network Diagram, the Software Requirements Specification (SRS), and the Software Design Specification (SDS) — to accurately plan for the testing services listed above. Our test planning will include development of the product test plan, test cases, and test data sets used to qualify the product for all requested testing. Products are therefore qualified according to the detail listed in their associated specifications documentation.
Information System (IS) Development, Information Assurance (IA) and Information Technology (IT) Support
The developments, augmentation, support, and operation of various DoD information systems has proven to be one of the most active segments in NorthTide’s business. Through the development of new systems, we have supported the Government on many different projects. NorthTide and our partners have worked with hardware and software manufacturers to provide full turn-key end to end solutions to our customers. In this way we can help them to achieve return on investment (ROI), data center consolidation, network center sustainment and support, and product life cycle updates.
Onsite and remote IT support are a well situated compliment to the development efforts that we have undertaken in the past. Information assurance is an integral part of any project undertaken with the United States Government, more so when undertaken with DoD agencies. We have worked hard to develop policies and practices that adhere to the new risk-focused security approach developed by the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST). NorthTide is strongly positioned to provide all aspects of IS and IT related services to the Navy in support of their mission.
Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence and Interoperability (C4I2) services has been at the core of projects that NorthTide has undertaken on behalf of the Government. Specifically, the USPACOM IT Modernization and Support program, NorthTide is supporting the Command, Control, Communications, and Cyber Directorate (J6). The support NorthTide is providing consists of various senior level engineers, system administrators, system integrators, information assurance specialist, and managers to perform reoccurring IT support, specifically: engineering, implementation and documentation of applications and hardware.
NorthTide engineers support the USPACOM program, as the project lead for the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 Migration, were responsible for soliciting requirements and mission objectives, performing surveys of hardware and software components, and making recommendations that were cognizant of product compatibility and integrated subsystem interoperability. The project encompassed multiple design criteria and performance standards recommendations; both for interoperability with existing infrastructure and for new infrastructure being implemented. Major compatibility design criteria revolved around SMTP relay functionality and the existing SMTP infrastructure. Other design criterial was in relation to new ePO server enhancements and enterprise functionality vs. native Red Hat features (HIPS vs. SELinus, UVscan vs. VSE). Performance standards were based on number of logs/per hour for SPLUNK services and minimal query times from the SPLUNK indexer. The program also consists of a full-time NorthTide Project Manager that works with our engineering team to plan and coordinate the acquisition of assets purchased by the Government. He provides the planning for the integration and deployment of acquired assets/software using established Project Management principles. He develops the project schedules in coordination with USPACOM J64 representatives and provides risk assessment planning throughout the lifecycle of the projects. The Project Manager conducts regularly scheduled meetings in order to gather information needed to ensure the configuration designs and implementations meet USPACOM IT infrastructure and mission requirements.
NorthTide’s IA Certification and Accreditation Specialist provides IA research and analysis to develop Certification and Accreditation (C&A) recommendation/documentation in accordance with USPACOM policies, and in keeping with the transformation from DOD Information Assurance Certification and Accreditation Program (DIACAP) to a National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) based program for all projects under the control of the IT Services Division (J64). Specifically, as a result of the IA research, the IA Certification and Accreditation Specialist, with guidance from the USPACOM Information Assurance team (J636), evaluates, recommends, and prepares the appropriate IA/Network Operations risk management reviews and C&A documentation for J64 managed networked systems used for the transmission and storage of information in voice, data, and/or video formats.
Interoperability, Test and Evaluation, Trials Support
NorthTide, through its executive leadership past experience and on the NSFDG LMR system upgrade project have provided support to the Nay in the task area for Interoperability, Test and Evaluation, and Trials and Installation Check-out Support. NorthTide has extensive experience with supporting the Navy in the development and adjudication of the Requirements Traceability Matrix (RTM). This document provides the team the ability to trace system requirements to tests that are needed to validate that the requirements are satisfied. The goal of the RTM is to make sure that the customer’s requirements are addressed and covered in all phases of the system development. On the NSFDG LMR upgrade project and projects of similar nature, NorthTide’s engineers will develop a Functional Acceptance Test Plan. This test plan was developed for two testing environments; In-Plant and In-Field. The In-Plant Functional Acceptance Test Plan was used to conduct system level testing on all the equipment based on the features and functionality that the system design details. The In-Field Functional Acceptance Test Plan was used to provide the customer with a means to validate the operational stability of the system and to verify system functionality and performance to ensure all committed functions were fully operational. The In-Plant and In-Field Functional Test Plans provide the Navy with real-time data and test procedures for validation of the system requirements (based on the RTM) and provide specific data to the Navy for installation check-out via the System Operation and Verification Test (SOVT). NorthTide has supported the Navy in the development of project SOVTs. Most recently, NorthTide completed the SOVT for the NSFDG LMR system upgrade SOVT. The SOVT detailed the project scope, reference documents, safety and security measures, project environment (test locations, approach, criteria and hardware architecture), defined roles and responsibilities, problem reporting processes, tests and objectives, schedule, and stakeholder contacts. The SOVT incorporated all the information for the test phases from In-Plant through final system testing and check-out. NorthTide, upon completion of the system check-out, worked with the Navy to complete the SOVT Final Report.
Logistics Support
Training Support
NorthTide understands that once a system is implemented and prepared for hand-off to the end-user, system training is vital to the real-life operation of the system. We also understand the unique challenge of developing and delivering training packages to the warfighter and foreign military service including overcoming language and cultural differences involving delivery of formal training. Our approach to training is to:
In-Service Engineering, Fleet Introduction, Installation and Checkout Support
Diego Garcia
Program Support
PACOM info
Functional and Administration Support
NSSA write up